Despite strong offensive showing, Sun Devils defeated by Santa Clara 14-13

(Photo: Marina Williams/WCSN)

PHOENIX — With Arizona State Baseball trailing Santa Clara 11-8 with two outs in the seventh, catcher Ryan Campos stepped up to the plate to face freshman righty Max Bayles, who had just entered the contest.

In the Sun Devils’ first two games of the season, the junior’s bat had been relatively quiet, going a combined 1-for-7 with three walks and three strikeouts, but quickly found his stride on Sunday. Campos hit a two-run shot in the first inning to give ASU a 3-1 lead and went deep again in the seventh, tying the game at 11 with one majestic swing that sent the first pitch he saw sailing over the left-field wall.

Fast-forward to the bottom of the ninth, this time with one out on the board, and he had another chance to even the score. Santa Clara had again taken the lead in the top of the inning thanks to a two-run homer from senior outfielder JonJon Berring — his 10th and 11th RBI of the series — to make it 14-12, but ASU redshirt senior outfielder Harris Williams cut the deficit to one with a solo blast to lead off the inning.

Campos got ahold of a 1-2 pitch and, off the bat, it appeared he had indeed put enough on it to clear the wall and once again tie the game. However, his drive didn’t carry, and was caught at the warning track. Three at-bats later with two outs, sophomore outfielder Isaiah Jackson, who went 6-for-14 on the weekend with two homers and 10 RBI, popped it up to freshman second baseman Ben Cleary, who easily made the catch. Game over.

The mood was somewhat sour following ASU’s (2-1) 14-13 loss to the Broncos (1-2), but it wasn’t without a sense of pride. After all, the Sun Devils managed to win a series against an experienced team coming off an NCAA Regionals appearance — stiff competition for the first series of the season.

“We’ve got a tough team,” Campos said. “(It) kind of still stings that we just lost that game, we should have won it. But we’ve got a tough team, and I think the loss is something to build off from this weekend.

“(Santa Clara is) a good team over there. Sometimes you’ve got to give them credit. They were working hard pitch to pitch and they got us. I wouldn’t say we struggled, we made some mistakes and they took advantage of it every time. Sometimes that’s just how it goes, but I like that there’s no shying away from it… I definitely take more positives from negatives from this weekend.”

As was the case in the first two games of the series, ASU’s lineup was needed to erase multiple deficits. In a 3-1 hole after the first, Santa Clara scraped across three runs in the second frame to re-take the lead. Bering tied the game with a two-RBI single, and senior third baseman Efrain Manzo gave his team the lead with an RBI single of his own.

Berring and Cleary combined for three more runs in the third — with the former belting a two-run homer into center field — and just like that, the Sun Devils trailed 7-3. But in the bottom of the frame, the run support re-emerged for the home team, as freshman second baseman Ethan Mendoza and Williams each contributed two-RBI singles to draw ASU even. Mendoza finished his first career start with five singles and three RBI in five at-bats while shortstop Jax Ryan, a freshman who also got the nod on Sunday, went 1-for-3.

“I just came today trying to help the team win,” Mendoza said. “And I mean, that’s awesome, obviously amazing for me personally, but the team didn’t come out on top. So hopefully next time we get the win.”

But as the game progressed, it remained seemingly impossible to keep Santa Clara in check for too long. The Broncos poured on four more runs in the fifth and sixth, but ASU once again responded with a four-spot in the seventh. After the two teams traded runs in the eighth, Berring gave the visitors the lead in the final inning and never looked back.

“You could look at the positives of it,” head coach Willie Bloomquist said. “We bounced back several times to tie or take the lead against these guys. We were extremely resilient from a team standpoint, energy was great all weekend long… We came up a little short today.”

Despite another staggering performance from the bats, such a high-scoring game certainly points to issues on the mound. Redshirt sophomore right-hander Tyler Meyer, who missed all of last season due to labrum surgery, had his first start in nearly two years on Sunday, but he likely didn’t enjoy the return he was hoping for. Meyer had trouble with command, as he had three wild pitches and only 32 of his 60 pitches landed inside the zone. He also conceded seven hits and five runs — four earned — despite tossing six strikeouts through his 2.2-inning start.

Things didn’t get better immediately after Meyer exited the game. In 2.0 innings of work, junior righty Jonah Giblin allowed seven baserunners and was tagged for five runs. However, sophomore Ben Jacobs was impressive in his second relief appearance of the season, only relinquishing a solo home run and fanning four. Another bright spot was freshman Hunter Omlid, who pitched the final 1.1 innings of the contest with just one Berring’s two-run shot against his name.

While ASU’s pitching results haven’t been immediate, Bloomquist pointed to the experience of Santa Clara’s lineup compared to his own largely inexperienced staff.

“Part of this is trying to give some of these guys, I want to say a soft landing,” Bloomquist said. “There isn’t really such a thing this weekend, but in trying to put them in situations where they have a chance to be successful… We were just kind of throwing guys into the fire and trying to get outs, but we’re going to need to evolve a little bit better, as a pitching staff, in order to shorten games a little bit better than we’re doing right now.”

The Sun Devils’ opening series certainly didn’t finish the way they wanted it to, but there are many positives to take from Sunday’s game that show promise for the rest of the season. While pitching has been and will continue to be a question mark, ASU’s staff performed well enough to earn two wins, not to mention against one of the stronger programs in the country.

“Winning in college baseball, sweeping in college baseball is the hardest thing to do,” Williams said. “I thought we put our best foot forward today, and you look up at the scoreboard after and you come up a little bit short. But if we keep playing the game we played this whole weekend, watch out for the Devils.”